Given that Dell has been selling PCs for more than 20 years you’d think it would have every base covered, but not until now has it offered a rugged notebook. (Image:notebook)

The Latitude ‘ATG D620’ is the rather militaristic name given to a machine which claims to meets military requirements for vibration, humidity and altitude (though I’ve always found ”klutzes” to be a far more demanding subgroup than armed forces).

Inside you’ll find a shock mounted hard drive while the keyboard is spill resistant, the ports have covers and it is coated in what Dell loosely describes as ‘high durable paint’.

On the specs side of things there’s the usual range of Intel Core 2 Duo processors, capacity for up to 4GB of DDR2 RAM and WiFi while the 14.1in screen is protected with a glass overlay while an anti-reflective coating and boasted brightness improve readability outdoors.

Being a rugged machine, the ATG D620 comes with a price premium but at $2,499 it is significantly less than most laptops of this ilk. It’s on manoeuvre in the US now and is scheduled to scale our beaches in the next few weeks.